Nudgee with SP's - Success

[Captian_Zero]

Hi

Fished Kedron Brook at Nudgee this morning from about 6.15am. Fished with SP’s (some little Wilson grubs amber with gold speckles, fished on 1/16oz jigheads) with the hope of getting a few flathead.

I started at the dog park and walked along the bank from there towards the bay. After about 20 minutes I was yet to get a touch and was beginning to think this would be a repeat of my last two attempts with the SP’s when I got a hit and managed to land a pike of about 27cm. I was on the board. This pike was quickly followed by another about the same size.

After that, things went quiet for about half an hour and then I managed to hook up again to what I think was a herring of about 15cm. It had swallowed the whole SP.

Soon after I got the flathead I had come for but unfortunately it was only 20cm long and had to go back. Another two pike (best of 30cm) rounded off a confidence building morning. [smiley=2thumbsup.gif]

Thanks to everyone for the advice.

Regards

Chris

[agnes_jack]

Good on ya Chris!
Persistance pays, keep at em!

Regards, Tony :D

[Gorilla_in_Manila]

Well done Chris,
I too was having a bit of a slow start with flatties on SP's.
Not sure if you only want to catch them on SP's or if you would also like a feed whilst learning.
I accellerated my sucess rate a bit by using bait in a SP kind of way. We found a batch of small WA pillies at our local bait shop. 4 to 5 inches long only. Rigged them by inserting the barb of a 1/0 longshank hook into the pilchard and laying the shank along the back of the pillie so that the eye of the hook was just behind the eye of the fish. Then put a half hitch over the snout of the pilchard. Trace was about 40 to 50cm of 10lb mono with a small ball above a swivel.
If you try it out in the water at your feet you will see that the rigged pillie swims along very much like a SP, and you fish it in much the same way. After finding where the fish were in this way, I then swapped over to SP's and caught a few on them as well.
Other times I tried the SP's first and didn't get any hits. Swapped to the pilchards and fished the same spot and got a couple of fish. Swapped back to SP's and got some more. Guess the smell of the bait must have turned them on bit.
Anyway, just a thought if you were still feeling a bit frustrated at the lack of a feed.
Cheers
Jeff

[Chrisso]

Good stuff. It seems patience does pay off.

Once you catch a few, you begin to believe in them, and you catch more.

Good luck in future trips.

[ba229]

yep, good work captain zero.

I find i am catching more fish on SP's than i even did on bait. keep up the practice and remember if the fish ain't there you won't catch them no matter what you use.

[Dylan_Rylatt]

good effort chris top report

Dylan

[bidkev]

Good going Chris.

I didn't get down there till about 9.00 with the kids. I fished "the spit" whilst the dog went berserk with the seagulls :-) Threw out half a gar on the beach rod (12 times) which simply kept the sandies fed, but fishing with the little rod I also pulled some pike. They took the green flouro bead everytime I reeled in after the pickers had stripped me. Unfortunately I was travelling light and didn't have any plastics or lures with me. The kids pulled some poddys in the net and putting one on the hook produced one long run before it was dropped. The clouds came in and I had to bugger off as the washing was on the line.......oh the joys of being a house husband :-)

cheers

kev

[Captian_Zero]

Thanks for all the replies guys and your advice over the last month or so.

Jeff - Yesterday's effort was specifically aimed at getting some practice and confidence up on the SP's and a feed would have been a bonus. There is a certain sense of achievement though in catching a fish on an SP however I am not going to dispense with bait fishing altogether. I have never specifically targetted flatties before, but intend to this spring so I will give your suggestion a go.

Kev - I was packing up and leaving about when you were arriving. I do fish there a little bit so maybe we will catch up for a chat one day.

Regards

Chris

[Gorilla_in_Manila]

Chris,

Yeah, I can understand the achievement of landing a few on the SP's (or flies or lures); personally cant get too barred up over it though.

Had what I thought was an intereting lesson in the variables involved with fishing.
After good results over the course of a couple of weeks, was fishing the same stretch of beach with the old bloke and I wasn't getting too much. I'd got 1 flattie and a few half arsed hits on the pillies, but was a pretty quiet afternoon. Dad was fishing with pippies and had half a dozen whiting, a couple of bream and a few flathead. Anyway, got back to a hole near the car just on sundown and I covered all the likely looking spots in it with a pillie - nothing.
Dad rocks up about 10mins later says, "Water looks good, whats happening?"
"Not a touch, quiet today", says I.
He lobs a pippi in where I had previously had half a dozen casts, and bang, he's reeling in a 50cm flattie. Grins at me and say, "Must have just swam in when I got here."
I cast near there again whilst he's having a chuckle and shoving that jolly flathead in his tucker bag - me, nothing.
Dad casts again 2m away from where my bait is sitting, bang he's got another one.
Go figure! ???
No way was I going to stick a pippie on and have him pull another one from right beside me, so I pack up whilst he's reeling it in and cracking himself up with clever comments. ::)

Found it interesting that the fish were there, the fish were biting, but the previously proven method of getting them wasn't working that day.

Cheers
Jeff

[bidkev]

Thanks for all the replies guys and your advice over the last month or so.

<snip>
Kev - I was packing up and leaving about when you were arriving. I do fish there a little bit so maybe we will catch up for a chat one day.

Regards

Chris

Look forward to it mate. I take the dog for a run/swim there fairly often.......keep your bait covered if she's around :-)

cheers

kev

[beefaman]

Mate, well done! It really is persistence, patience and practice....if you want to catch a few flatties down there, get some Atomic garlic scent, works wonders on the lizards [smiley=2thumbsup.gif]

[Captian_Zero]

Fished at Nudgee again this morning with SP's. Result = 1 sand crab, 1 toadfish and 1 small flattie (under 20cm). Better than nothing.

Had about 8 plastics come back without tails. I assume this was the toadfish or crabs but I am not sure. I was using the same Wilson grubs as lat time, which are quite small (3cm). Would using larger plastics reduce the loss of tails?

Another guy fishing with larger plastics landed a flathead of 55cm.

Regards

Chris

[joeT]

Toadfish love eating the tails off plastics. Gets quite expensive after a while.

[beefaman]

Toadies love SP's!!! Flathead will eat anything. Have caught them at nudgee on anything from 1" to 5" SP's!!

[Cloud_9]

try thr bigger Sp's like the 4" and 5" atomics brite colours greens and pinks. big squidgies too pinks and the blue ones.

Cheers Cloud 9